Carol Brightman, �Total Insecurity: The Myth of American Omnipotence�
Here is yet another book sent to me to do a �real� review for the magazine Maximum RockNRoll. This is the fourth book I�ve reviewed for them, and they published every article, so at least I have current clips for the admissions offices of colleges across the country.
The editors at the magazine have had a fair pulse on what to send me. Hell the first book was by Mumia Abu-Jamal, which is something I would have bought had it come into the store. This way, I got it for free.
This book however, I doubt I would have picked up for myself. The subject matter is interesting enough, but it�s put together in that dreary War is bad. Bush brought war. Therefore, Bush is bad presentation. It also doesn�t help that Brightman uses her experiences as a fucking hippy in the 60s during the Vietnam War to show how they relate to the problems of the present.
I can�t print the review here, so you�ll just have to seek out the magazine if you�re trying to get every and all things Dean related. But I will say that reading this book and finding something intelligent to say about it wasn�t easy. (Yes, it�s obvious that I would be hard pressed to find something intelligent to say. Ha ha. Who�s a funny little monkey? Is it you? I think it is!)
No, it wasn�t easy because there�s just too much going on in my life that�s bad. Of course, I started this almost immediately after breaking up with my girlfriend. And in between reading and writing about it, I�ve not only had to deal with the on-again, off-again affections of my ex-girlfriend, but I�m also trying to study for the GRE test, and figure out where I�m going to apply for graduate school, while wondering how I�m going to find a place to live and work once I get there. Plus there are my possessions, my cat, my friends, and my sanity.
But I�d be lying if I claimed the ex-girlfriend wasn�t paramount to everything else. I can�t stop thinking about her. Sometimes, these feelings have been good. for the majority, they are not. I just find myself incredibly sad most of the time. It�s times like this that I wish my face weren�t so expressive. I went to the local dive bar on Saturday, trying to keep a straight face and the fucking bartender within two minutes of me being there said, �Lemme guess, that hot chick you�re usually with dumped you.�
�No,� I said, �I dumped her.�
�Sure buddy, you keep telling yourself that. Maybe eventually, you�ll believe it.�
At least he didn�t charge me for that round. Bastard.
In the meantime, I get to watch the other bar patrons do their normal thing � drinking, carousing, socializing and playing the standard pick-up games. Oh look, there�s the guy who got busted for a hate crime, now picking up on a Mexican girl. That�s almost funny. There�s the person that has herpes � I wonder if they bothered to mention that little tidbit to their partner. Probably not. There�s the guy in the corner, being a little too loud about his conquests, which probably means that he�s overcompensating.
Fuck. These are the times where losing my girlfriend hits the hardest. I had somebody who I didn�t need to play those idiotic games with. I had a partner in crime. I had a teammate. Now I have nothing. The sadness of the situation hits me like a sledgehammer. My chest tightens. It feels like I can�t breathe.
It�s not always like this. Sometimes I get an e-mail out of the blue from her, or a phone call. Occasionally, we even spend time together. These moments usually keep me upbeat and calm. For two or three days, anyway. Then something creeps into my psyche, something in myself that seems intent on making me feel miserable. Sometimes, there�s a reason behind it. Most times, there isn�t.
It�s the latter that I hate. I feel unbalanced, or worse, clingy. I�ve always been strong and independent. Lately, that�s been hard to do. When it gets bad I keep hoping that she�ll call or even better, show up. Every time the phone rings, I hope it will be her. Whenever the door opens at work, I�m thinking that she�ll walk in.
She doesn�t.
Finally, it gets to be too much, and I call. She tries to help. She does help. But it�s almost worse that way, because I had to bring it about. Like she�s being kind out of pity.
Today was one of those days. I was feeling so bad that I was making audible pain-filled noises while working. I occasionally had to hide in the back corners of the room, trying to strengthen my resolve while the Al Green song played over the stereo at work. I later noticed she altered her description of me on her list of favorite blogs. Where it used to say, �I think Dean gets all his girlfriends by feeding them vodka and Vicodin. I mean, shit � it worked on me.� it now says �Dean gets all his girlfriends with vodka and Vicodin.�
That�s not much of a change, but with as bad as I felt, it seemed so permanent, so final. I send her a short e-mail saying as such.
She answered with a perfunctory response about two hours later, essentially saying, �Shit, it had to happen sometime. Sorry it made you sad, though.�
Another way of reading this is to say, �Deal with it.�
Of course, all I said was that it made me sad. She didn�t know how bad I was feeling. But she didn�t ask either.
So it�s hard to get worked up and nervous and insecure about a book that�s attempting to detail how bad the world has become and how close we are to ending it.
Not to sound melodramatic, but at this point, I�d practically welcome it.
